“If you have good fri­ends, you don’tneed a mir­ror” I once read on the mir­ror in a bath­room. I think this say­ing real­ly has some­thing to it. And tha­t’s why I wish ever­yo­ne would stop nee­ding a mir­ror to see them­sel­ves. Can I ask you how many clo­se fri­ends you have? I’m not tal­king about the fri­ends you can go par­ty­ing with, but tho­se with whom you share your most per­so­nal expe­ri­en­ces and deepest fee­lings and thoughts. Ide­al­ly, this appli­es to three peo­p­le, reve­als psy­cho­the­ra­pist Wolf­gang Krü­ger. The­se clo­se fri­ends also have the man­da­te to speak into your life and ques­ti­on things. They also show you the “blind spots”, i.e. the things in your own per­so­na­li­ty that remain hid­den. Inci­den­tal­ly, this feed­back real­ly helps you to grow in your own per­so­na­li­ty and deve­lop fur­ther.

Unfort­u­na­te­ly, the­se fri­ends are very rare. But how do you get the­se clo­se fri­end­ships, the­se bud­dies with whom you can go through thick and thin and who put up with you even when you’­re not in a good mood? Clo­se fri­ends are not a pro­duct of chan­ce, but also have a lot to do with your beha­vi­or. Here are 9 tips for good fri­end­ships:

1) Do you allow peo­p­le you have cho­sen to look into your life? Are you able to open up to the per­son? It’s real­ly bra­ve to take the first step and share your inner thoughts. For exam­p­le, if you’­re not fee­ling so well at the moment, don’t pre­tend that ever­y­thing is fine, but honest­ly admit that some­thing is wrong. Expe­ri­ence has shown that this also helps the other per­son to open up bit by bit and tell you about them­sel­ves.

2) Do you give cer­tain fri­ends the man­da­te to speak into your life? In other words, do you allow them to cri­ti­ci­ze you and ques­ti­on your actions? This can some­ti­mes hurt a lot, but it’s real­ly hel­pful. It does­n’t mean that you have to imple­ment ever­y­thing, but you should at least check and keep the good things (this is also a pie­ce of wis­dom from the Bible, by the way).

3) Do you ask cer­tain fri­ends for their honest opi­ni­on and are you gra­teful for it, even if they don’t tell you what to say?

4) Are you pre­pared to make sacri­fices for the other per­son and to be the­re for them when they need your help?

5) Are you genui­ne­ly inte­res­ted in the other per­son and do you lis­ten to them? Admit­ted­ly: Lis­tening is often not so easy for me.

6) Are you wil­ling to for­gi­ve your boyfriend/girlfriend if he/she has hurt you?

7) Do you ask for for­gi­ve­ness yours­elf when you’­ve mes­sed up or do you try to cover up your mista­kes? It is often not easy for us to ask for for­gi­ve­ness, but we rea­li­ze that when we do so, we don’t lose an inch of our crown, but rather gain ano­ther inch.
By the way: If you have expe­ri­en­ced the for­gi­ve­ness of Jesus in your life, then it will also be easier for you to for­gi­ve others and the gre­at thing is: Jesus will help you if you ask him to.

8) Are you pre­pared to share the shirt off your back with others or do they only get the shirts you have out­grown? In other words: gene­ro­si­ty is a sign of true fri­end­ship.

9) The­re are cer­tain­ly many more things that will help you on your way to real­ly good fri­end­ships. But the most important thing is: try to be a best fri­end yours­elf. Good luck with that!